NJ office market making significant recovery

Real Estate Weekly, Dec 10, 1997 by Emanuel Stern

Trends in this region are especially magnified in Hudson County and the Meadowlands area - mainly because of the region's natural proximity.

In other words, the region offers tenants easy access to the rest of the world. Combine that with the region's ability to hold large office and industrial space, and you have instant success.

Hartz Mountain's office space centers around this region. And because of our offices proximity to major highways, such as the New Jersey Turnpike, Routes 1, 3, 9, 287, and 495, as well as shipping lanes and airports, we have been able to attract many well known tenants.

Our office buildings are so close to Manhattan that we have been able to offer businesses a very unique opportunity. By developing in the aforementioned region, we are not only able to offer our tenants more space and greater travel options, but we can also give them greater exposure to the rest of the world without paying Manhattan-type rents.

And while our buildings are well-maintained and built in good surroundings, we have been able to attract large business anchors to the area - sparking unprecedented state and local economic growth.

Because of this, New Jersey is coming out as a winner in the CBD market.

For the first time in my tenure as president, I can say that real estate in New Jersey has become a good business to be in allowing Hartz to develop on an opportunistic basis.

Proof of our opportunistic development can be seen in the new Doubletree Hotel in Jersey City. The building is currently under construction and as we speak it is coming up from the ground.

Even the apparel industry is starting to lease from our large office buildings. So far, Nautica, Marty's Shoes, and By Design have also leased space from Hartz Mountain.

To date, we have executed leases totaling one million square feet in the Meadowlands region, and we are expecting to rent out one-million more by the end of the year. With all of this activity, there is no reason why the CBD market in New Jersey should not take off in the next two years.

Hartz Mountain currently owns and operates a private portfolio of 175 buildings containing over 30 million square feet with no recourse debt. The portfolio-wide vacancy rate of 5 percent proves a bright future for New Jersey's real estate market.

Hartz is a one-stop shop for all your clients' real estate needs, with full-scale in-house departments for architecture, construction, development, and planning.